Though it already boasts the tonsil talents of Seth Rogen and Melissa McCarthy, two people proven to be thoroughly funny, DreamWorks Animation isn’t stopping there with regards to B.O.O.: Bureau Of Otherworldly Operations. The company has announced via Twitter that Bill Murray, Octavia Spencer and Jennifer Coolidge are now among the cast.

Billed as a supernatural action comedy, the new film finds a pair of bumbling ghosts (Rogen and McCarthy) who join the Bureau and do their best to take down evil spirits. A real threat emerges when they must tackle the Most Wanted Haunter.

Murray is set to play a villainous spirit called Addison Drake, while Spencer is the no-nonsense Captain Book and Coolidge is ditzy transitions-relations officer Carol Sue. They join an ensemble that also includes Rashida Jones and Matt Bomer.

Tony Leonidis is directing from a script by Tom Wheeler. “Bill Murray is the perfect actor to bring this character to life – or should I say ‘after-life?” says Leondis in the official statement. “Along with Jennifer and Octavia, this is a dream cast. I can’t imagine a team more capable of packing a funnier punch to this broadly comedic ghost story.” We can but hope they all deliver.

B.O.O. is set to haunt our cinemas on July 17, 2015. The big question now – will Bill Murray have to bust himself? And will it make him feel good?

Syfy is giving a 13-episode greenlight to Helix (working title), its newest original scripted series for 2013, it was announced today by Mark Stern, President of Original Content, Syfy and Co-Head Original Content, Universal Cable Productions. Helix is Executive Produced by Ronald D. Moore (Battlestar Galactica), Lynda Obst (Sleepless in Seattle, Contact), Steven Maeda (Lost, CSI: Miami, The X-Files) and Cameron Porsandeh, who wrote the pilot, will serve as Co-Executive Producer. The series will be produced by Sony Pictures Television.

Helix is an intense thriller about a team of scientists from the Centers for Disease Control who travel to a high-tech research facility in the Arctic to investigate a possible disease outbreak, only to find themselves pulled into a terrifying life-and-death struggle that holds the key to mankind’s salvation or total annihilation.

“With its well-drawn characters, taut drama, and incredible production team, we couldn’t be more excited to see this intense thrill-ride of a series come to life,” said Mark Stern

Helix is expected to begin production early in 2013 to debut later this year.

One day, it seems, every Robert Rodriguez film will eventually become a TV series. While El Mariachi: The Series is proceeding without his involvement, Rodriguez is very much a part of bringing From Dusk Till Dawn to the box via his El Rey network in the US.

The show is planned as a 10-episode serialized drama (at least to begin with), and is firmly based on the movie, albeit without George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino in the lead roles. We’re promised a supernatural crime saga focused on bank robber, Seth Gecko (D.J. Cotrona) and his violent, unpredictable brother, Richard “Richie” Gecko (Zane Holtz), who are wanted by Sheriff Earl McGraw (Don Johnson, taking over the part from Michael Parks) and a new character, Texas Ranger Freddie Gonzalez (Jesse Garcia) after a bank heist left several people dead.

While on an escape route to Mexico, Seth and Richie encounter former minister Jacob Fuller and his family who they take hostage. Using the family RV to make a run for the Mexican border, chaos ensues when the group detours to a strip club that is unknowingly populated by vampires, and forces them to fight until dawn in order to get out alive. The series deepens the tone of the film, adds new characters and backstories and expands the Mesoamerican mythology behind the vampires.

"If the movie’s the short story, the series is the novel,” says Rodriguez. "We have assembled an amazing cast and crew, and viewers can expect to be part of a wild ride when the series premieres on El Rey Network.” He’s helping to kick the series off by directing the first two episodes, but Carlos Coto is serving as the show’s executive producer. Miramax will be distributing the series outside the States, though not in the UK, where there’s no channel on board just yet.

DOCTOR WHO: A Companion’s Companion – Season 26After several seasons of meh-to-cruddy writing and production, Doctor Who was finally starting to pick up some narrative and thematic traction again in Season 25. Script Editor Andrew Cartmel was focusing evermore on the Doctor’s mysterious past and place as the galactic chess master, which star Sylvester McCoy more than ate up. With the inclusion of companion Ace (Sophie Aldred), the series had one of its deepest secondary characters ever and one whose past and future would be explored fully in the next season. Too bad it was the show’s last.

After another 8 years of no televised Doctor Who, but heaps and gobs of Eighth Doctor novels and Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, and Eighth Doctor audio plays, it came time for a return. In 2003, the show’s 40th anniversary, a Flash-animated web series called “Scream of the Shalka” was produced. However, the thunder from this was completely stolen, because it was also announced that a proper live-action series would be returning to BBC One, headed up by Queer as Folk and Casanova creator Russell T. Davies, who had also been a long-time fan and had written for the Virgin New Adventures novel range.

Since the show had been off the air since 1989, save for that one 90-minute period in May of 1996, it was deemed pertinent by BBC Wales’ Commissioner of Drama Jane Tranter and producers Davies, Julie Gardner, and Phil Collinson to have an established, name actor in the lead role, since they weren’t sure how the larger public would react. They decided upon character actor Christopher Eccleston, who had worked with Davies before and had been the writer’s first choice for a role in Queer as Folk.

The companion, a formerly thankless role, really, would now be coming to the forefront, as would their family and relationships. Davies was key in turning the show into more of a character-based adventure drama than a strictly sci-fi play, the way the classic series had largely been. Ace’s turn in the last two seasons of the old show, as well as Dr. Grace Halloway in the TV movie, must surely have influenced Davies in the creation of Rose Tyler, a 19-year-old shopgirl from London with a flirty mom and a dumb boyfriend.

To play this part, Davies cast pop star Billie Piper, which at the time must have felt a bit like stunt casting, or at least trying to appeal to the younger audiences with a known personality. I had no idea who she was, so it didn’t do anything for me but upon retrospect. It is largely through Rose that the story of the first series of the rebooted Doctor Who played out, and it’s much easier for the audience to side with someone they already like.

Now, whether it was always intended for Eccleston to do just one series of the show or not is debatable, but what is known is that he was not pleased with the first batch of filming, which it has to be said produced possibly the worst episodes of the series. And, it’s also sad that the night of the premiere in 2005 came with the announcement that the actor wouldn’t return after this series.

Everybody’s gearing up for the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who, which is now a scant two weeks away, but BBC America wants you to know that “The Day of the Doctor” won’t be the only bit of Time Lord entertainment that week – not by a long shot. The cable network is actually devoting just about its entire week’s worth of programming from Monday, November 18th, through Sunday, November 24th to The Doctor. That, traditionally-non-sports fans, is 7 days of Doctor Who, and a lot of it is brand new! Let’s do the rundown, shall we?

Monday November 18th A marathon of The Doctors Revisited specials from the First Doctor through the Tenth Doctor. 9:00am-9:00pm ET

The U.S. premiere of Doctor Who: Tales from the TARDIS, in which stars and staff from over the course of 50 years speak about their time on the show and their experiences journeying through the cosmos. Will include Matt Smith, David Tennant, Tom Baker, Peter Davison, Jenna Coleman, Karen Gillan, Freema Agyeman, William Russell, and Steven Moffat. 9:00pm-10:00pm ET

The U.S. premiere of The Science of Doctor Who with Brian Cox. Not the actor Brian Cox, who will be in An Adventure in Space and Time, mind you, but Professor Brian Cox. Just think of it as “Dr. Brain Cox.” He’ll take you through the conceptual science behind the amazing things the Doctor does. Likely he will also tell you none of it is possible in real life, but that’s the fun of imagination.

The U.S. Premiere of Doctor Who Explained which was shown in Asia a few months back and is basically a starter kit for people not familiar with the show, exploring the history and cultural impact. All the same bods talk as the last one. 8:00pm-9:00pm ET

The U.S. Premiere of An Adventure in Space and Time, the docudrama following the creation and shooting of Doctor Who in the early-’60s through the William Hartnell days. 9:00pm ET

Global Simulcast of Doctor Who – “The Day of the Doctor.” This is the big one, kiddos! The Eleventh and Tenth Doctors team up with whichever Doctor John Hurt turns out to be to do something that will tear apart the fabric of what we all thought we knew about the character we’ve loved for so long. Matt Smith, David Tennant, and Jenna Coleman, with Billie Piper and John Hurt. It’ll be awesome, no doubt about it. Commercial free. 2:50pm ET

Encore Presentation of Doctor Who – “The Day of the Doctor.” Not simulcast and with commercials, probably. This will have exclusive interviews with Smith and Tennant during the broadcast and will be followed by the premiere of the new fantasy program Atlantis. 7:00pm ET.

The U.S. premiere of The Graham Norton Show episode featuring both Matt Smith and David Tennant. 10:00pm ET

Sunday November 24th The Matt Smith Countdown. The Top 11 Eleventh Doctor episodes as voted on by YOU, or at least people like you. 9:00am-8:00pm ET

Premiere of the Doctor Who: The Doctors Revisited special featuring the Eleventh Doctor. Cast, crew, and celebrity fans discuss the Eleventh Doctor and his time aboard the TARDIS, which will nearly be at an end by that time. 8:00pm-10:30pm ET

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And there you have it! Literally, if you turn on BBC America that week, there’ll be Doctor Who stuff to watch. I hope you’re excited because I sure as hell am. And be sure to use the hashtag #SaveTheDay. The Doctor said to do that.

Doctor Who comes back to television screens for the first time in essentially 16 years and for 13 weeks, it’s a hit again. Then, BOOM! The lead actor turns into a different guy at the end. Whether or not people were pleased about Christopher Eccleston leaving and David Tennant taking his place, the change forced new viewers to deal with the idea of regeneration right away. And, lucky for viewers, there was a chance to get used to this new weirdo with admittedly excellent hair in the form of a Christmas special, which would become a staple of Doctor Who since the return. Some are Christmassier than others, but few have as much to do narratively than The Christmas Invasion.

The CW has been looking to develop a new take on the syndicated series for a while now, and with Hill, Kurtzman and Orci on board, the network has ordered a script for the project. The CW is also poised to move quickly on the project: If it likes the script, the network could air the reboot as soon as this summer. Like the original George A. Romero-created series, the new “Tales” episodes will be 30 minutes long, episodes will be self-contained and every minute will be designed to scare the hell out of viewers.

Mitch Galin, Heather Kadin, and Jerry Golod will also serve as exec producers on the project, with Hill writing the script. The CW’s already proven it can scare up good rating in the summer with retro fare: Its new take on “Whose Line Is It Anyway?” was a big success. OK, Fox: Ball’s in your court to bring back “The X-Files.”

Netflix has ordered six episodes of what it is calling a fourth and final limited season to wrap up the Fox TV Studios series that began on AMC in 2011.

Veena Sud is back as showrunner of the moody drama that stars Mireille Enos and Joel Kinnaman as Seattle detectives enmeshed in murder cases. The U.S. adaptation is based on the Danish skein “Forbrydelsen.”

“Killing” was canceled by AMC in 2012 after two seasons, only to be revived when Netflix teamed with the cabler in a shared-window pact. After a low-rated third season, AMC opted to ax the show again earlier this year. But Fox TV Studios, Sud and her reps at WME quietly assembled a pitch for a final half-dozen segs that was strong enough to interest Netflix, given the show’s existing following. The first three seasons of the show are already available for streaming on the service.

Netflix emphasized in announcing the pickup the “Killing” this time around will be exclusive to its worldwide subscribers, which now number more than 40 million. As with all of its original series, Netflix will make the six segs available all at once, though a premiere date has not been specified. Production is expected to begin in February in Vancouver.

“The rich, serialized storytelling in ‘The Killing’ thrives on Netflix, and we believe that it is only fitting to give Sarah Linden and Stephen Holder a proper send off,” said Cindy Holland, veep of original content for Netflix. “We are looking forward to offering fans – both existing and new — a series that we know is perfectly suited for on-demand viewing.”

Fox TV Studios topper David Madden said: “It’s a true testament to ‘The Killing’ creator Veena Sud, and the stellar cast led so compellingly by Mireille Enos and Joel Kinnaman, that fans remained so passionate about the show. We’re gratified that our partners at Netflix recognized this.”

Who needs new TV shows? In this week’s issue of the magazine, our critics show us what’s in their personal collections of old culture, much of it you might’ve missed. All of it is available online, somewhere. Herewith, Matt Zoller Seitz on the eight great TV series you probably haven’t seen and seven great single episodes (or TV movies) you can find online.

SERIES

1. The Comeback (2005) This HBO faux-reality program from Sex and the City showrunner Michael Patrick King follows washed-up sitcom actress Valerie Cherish (Lisa Kudrow) as she struggles to reignite her career. It’s one of the greatest one-season wonders in TV history, as corrosively funny and honest as early Albert Brooks: It’s hide-under-the-couch humor.

2. The Richard Pryor Show (1977) You know Pryor as the foulmouthed storytelling genius of standup comedy and the mostly watered-down clown of scripted features, but you might not have experienced another facet of his talent: as a variety-show impresario who tackled race and class with a frankness never seen before (or, arguably, since).

3. The Kingdom (1994) Of all the horror series influenced by Twin Peaks, this Danish hospital soap from Lars von Trier (Antichrist, Dogville) might be the greatest; it’s periodically made available via legal streaming services, but the DVD is out of print and only a few copies are available, so it’s worth going the extra mile to seek it out. Just don’t watch it by yourself.

4. Star Blazers (1979–1981) The vogue for dubbed Japanese cartoons began in the seventies with Battle of the Planets, but this epic series about a refurbished battleship setting sail across the galaxy to save an apocalypse-ravaged Earth remains the reigning masterpiece of that era—and its serialized storytelling was ahead of its time.

5. The Newsroom (1996–2005) The CBC’s great comedy about the intellectual and ethical compromises at a daily-news show has the same name as HBO’s Aaron Sorkin lecture-fest, but it’s a hundred times smarter and much subtler. It’s great—Larry Sanders Show great, as a matter of fact.

6. The Singing Detective (1986) Dennis Potter’s musical psychodrama is about a detective (Michael Gambon) who memory-trips while bedridden by a horrendous skin disease; watch even an hour of it, and you’ll instantly sense that it’s one of the most profound creative influences on post-Sopranos TV and that Tony’s sixth-season sojourn in dream-space owes it quite a debt.

7 and 8. Clone Wars (2003–2005) and Samurai Jack (2001–2004) The world’s greatest living action filmmaker isn’t Michael Bay, James Cameron, or Steven Spielberg: It’s animator and illustrator Genndy Tartakovsky, who absolutely killed it with his cel-style Samurai Jack (a postapocalyptic sci-fi fantasy) and Clone Wars in the aughts. Every sequence is a marvel of bold, simple graphics, whip-crack timing, and strategic use of silence and overwhelming noise.

EPISODES AND TV MOVIES

1. The Lathe of Heaven (1980) PBS aired this adaptation of Ursula K. Le Guin’s novel about a man whose dreams come true, and its reputation has deservedly deepened with time. A touchingly young Bruce Davison plays the dreamer, George Orr; the film’s “futuristic” landscapes are mostly just newish buildings, and the score is all analog synthesizers except for the cover of “With a Little Help From My Friends,” used in a sequence involving a humanoid tortoise with a lightbulb for a face. Singular and striking.

2. The Last Dinosaur (1977) This Japanese and American co-production about a big-game hunter (a pretty clearly soused Richard Boone) tracking a T-Rex at the center of the Earth sounds silly, but if you can appreciate the old-school miniature landscapes and Godzilla-style creature costumes (and you should, because they’re amazing), the net effect is strangely haunting.

3. Masters of Horror “Homecoming” (2005) and “Cigarette Burns” (2005) This Showtime horror anthology from Stephen King buddy Mick Garris was hit-and-miss, but these two episodes—a post-9/11 antiwar nightmare by Joe Dante, and a cinephile’s fantasy-slash-nightmare of the ultimate find, by John Carpenter—are classics ranking with the best of The Twilight Zone and The Outer Limits.

4. All in the Family “Two’s a Crowd” (1978) and “Edith’s 50th Birthday Parts 1 & 2” (1977) Incredible as it might seem now, this socially aware Norman Lear sitcom isn’t the constant pop-culture presence it once was; if you’ve never sampled it, start with these three classic episodes. The first reveals the roots of Archie Bunker’s bigotry and anger. The others put Archie’s wife, Edith, in a situation that’s as grimly funny as it is horrifyingly tense, then deals (touchingly) with the aftermath.

5. Frank’s Place “Pilot” (1987) Unless you were one of the maybe eight people who watched this great comedy during its brief 1987–88 run on CBS, you have no idea why it keeps getting mentioned on lists of the great one-season shows of all time. Plug that knowledge gap forthwith by watching the pilot, which still feels uncategorizably fresh 26 years later.

6. Hill Street Blues “Trial by Fury” (1982) Ask anybody of a certain age, inside the TV industry or out, when they first realized that television could be art, and there’s a good chance they’ll mention this episode scripted by a young David Milch (Deadwood), in which precinct captain Furillo goes beyond the law to bring “justice” to a couple of rapists and suffers a real moral price.

7. Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman “Pilot” (1976) Produced by All in the Family’s Norman Lear and directed by Joan Darling and Jim Drake, this star vehicle for comic actress Louise Lasser was one of the boldest series of the seventies: a laugh-track-free send-up of soap operas that was also a surprisingly probing and intense critique of capitalism. Yes, really!

*This article originally appeared in the November 18, 2013 issue of New York Magazine.

When it was announced in 2009 that Matt Smith (then 27) would be taking over for David Tennant on Doctor Who, everybody went… “Who?” After all, he was so young and we hadn’t seen him in too much, so that seemed a fairly reasonable thing to say. Mind you, people said the same thing when a certain Tom Baker took over in 1974. The first thing we saw of Smith as the Eleventh Doctor was his comedic turn at the tail end of the otherwise atrocious “The End of Time,” but that wasn’t enough to truly let us know anything. And with Steven Moffat taking over as head writer, we really didn’t know anything of the kind of show Doctor Who was regenerating into. But we soon would.

After a spectacular night of global celebration for Doctor Who’s 50th Anniversary, Executive Producer and Head Writer Steven Moffat was presented with the Guinness World Record for the largest ever simulcast of a TV drama, following a global campaign from BBC Worldwide that saw The Day of the Doctor broadcast in 94 countries across 6 continents.

The award was presented by to Steven ahead of his first panel appearance today at the Doctor Who Celebration, a special three-day event spanning the anniversary weekend at London’s ExCeL. Cast members Matt Smith and Jenna Coleman were also in attendance along with thousands of fans from across the world.

On receiving the award, Steven Moffat says: “For years the Doctor has been stopping everyone else from conquering the world. Now, just to show off, he's gone and done it himself!”

Tim Davie, CEO BBC Worldwide (the BBC’s commercial arm) says: “We knew we were attempting something unprecedented in broadcast history, not only because Doctor Who is a drama, unlike a live feed event such as a World Cup football match or a Royal Wedding, but because we had to deliver the episode in advance to the four corners of the world so that it could be dubbed and subtitled into 15 different languages. If there was any doubt that Doctor Who is one of the world’s biggest TV shows, this award should put that argument to rest – and how fitting for it to receive such an accolade in its 50th year.”

Guinness World Records Editor-in-Chief, Craig Glenday, who presented the award, added: "Who else but the time-twisting Doctor could appear in 94 countries at once?! This outstanding achievement is testament to the fact that the longest running sci-fi TV show in history is not just a well-loved UK institution but a truly global success adored by millions of people.”

In addition to the TV broadcast, over 1500 cinemas worldwide, including in the UK, US, Australia, Canada, Latin America, Germany, Russia and Scandinavia, will show the episode in spectacular 3D with over half a million tickets sold.

In the run up to the 50th Anniversary, fans of the show across the world have been out in full force to be part of a global event. In Sweden and Norway where the programme has no client broadcaster, fans successfully petitioned to get their local cinemas to screen the episode. Similarly, fans in Argentina pushed a major cinema chain into showing the special simultaneously. In the US, an initial 10,000 cinema tickets sold out in 28 minutes without any marketing or advertising and in Germany, Cinemaxx, one of the largest cinema chains reported that the special had been the fastest non-movie pre-sale in their history.